How To Develop Positive Thinking In Children

Today is Saturday and we have planned to go to an event outside the town. This is a yearly event where hundreds of children meet with the same purpose, that is participating in a competition according to their talents and interests. Some of them come with high enthusiasm, some of them just follow what their parents said, and some of them aim to win. What about our children, Alex and Sandra? Alex is the eldest, he is turning 12 this December. Has been growing as a calm child, I think he inherits his mother’s characters, which is me.

Not much talking, rather than playing outside, he’d like to stay at home doing anything he likes, and he worries about many things surrounds. About his school, friends, competitions, even he worries about his future. Otherwise, Sandra (9 years old), always amazed us with her passion and the dreams she wants to realize. Well, I think she inherits her father’s characters. Sandra has positive thoughts in almost all of her activities. Win or lose, attending a new class, facing difficult situation, she deals with all of these wisely and she always thinks positively. I want Alex do the same, but how?”

1. Take care of your children

Be a tough mother/ father, be the role model for your children. No body’s perfect, no parent’s perfect, we are not perfect, but we can be the best for our. children by showing them positive attitudes and be the role model for them. Children learn. what they see and they live, as a well-known poem says:

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn

If children live with hostility, they learn to fight

If children live with ridicule, they learn to be shy

If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty

If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence

If children live with tolerance, they learn to be patient

If children live with praise, they learn to appreciate

If children live with acceptance, they learn to love

If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves

If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness

If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and others

If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.

2. Interpret things positively in your life, teach your children to do the same

Bad things happen in our lives. Accident, the death of our family, lose in a competition, failed in examination, fall down from a bike, and others, sometimes we cannot avoid those situation. It is our responsibility to give the right and proper explanation to our children. But how? They’re just kid who interpret their world simply. Exactly, we can talk to them as simple as it can be, with simple words for them to understand about what really happen, the implication, and what to do next. Make sure that you tell them it is okay to feel sad and crying, but, you have to convince them that they have to get up from the adversity, look forward, and continue their life.

3. Earlier is better, form this attitude as early as you can

Children learn fast, they absorb much from their environment. The earlier you train your children think positively, the better you will get the result in the future. Due to the differences between adult and children, of course we have to concern about the technical way to train them building this attitude. You can tell stories, show them videos, read them books, playing interactive games, and utilize other tools to ease you entering their minds until they internalize the values delivered.

Now let us imagine children who just spend their time with playing. How many times they got injured? How many times they fell down due to running without seeing anything surrounds? How many times? What would you say when you found your children face those situation? Are you going to blame the bike they ride? Or will you hit the stone they stumbled? No, don’t you ever blame on things nor not-guilty people if something bad happen to your children. Tell them softly that they have to be careful next time they ride the bike, or running over the playground, etc. They have to know the real cause that make them crying.

4. Do not compare your children one another

Comparing our children is not good because it affects their lives for a long term. Instead of growing a positive thought, comparing them either with siblings or with other children will only create an inferiority feeling which is bad for their development. If we are going to compare our children, then we must compare them with their own ability and capacity. Motivate them to go beyond their limits, tell them the positive lines, and let their confidence grow. So, by now, let’s stop comparing our children!

6. Communicate well with your children

To build positive thoughts on our children is to build a good communication in family. It’s not only mother whose responsible on this, it’s also father’s. Many ways we can use to communicate with our children nowadays, hence, no more reason for not communicating with them. Also remember, communication is not only an effort to make our children talk to us, it’s about creating a trust. When they trust us, they will create positive thoughts about us, then it is time for us to develop more positive thoughts on them.

7. Find out the best side of your children

It is not about showing your children’s skills to public and neither about gaining recognition from people due to your talented children. It is about building positive attitudes, positive thoughts, and positive characters to prepare them entering their world in the future. Children need life skills in order to make them survive reaching their dreams. Our responsibility is to discover the best side of our children, to give many experiences through their lives, to respect, to appreciate, and let them grow as happy children.

8. Ask for support from your big family and/ or environment

Last but not least, support from our big family and/ or environment is important too. It will strengthen what we already gave to our children. The more positive people surround them, the more they will perform positive thoughts.

The paragraph above is one of the stories told by a mom who came to me. She asked me to advice her on how she can nurture her children, especially building positive thoughts on her son, Alex. After talking with her, I gave her some suggestions as I will write in this article. But first, let’s see what we know about children development. Children development is a sequential progression of changes in terms of the physical, emotional, intellectual, and psychosocial aspect, as the children grow from birth to adolescence. There are factors influence the development of a child, i.e biological factors, environmental factors, interpersonal relationships, and early environments and experience.

Refers to the case of Alex and Sandra, first, we have to know the story of each child’s development according to the factors described above. Second, we have to remember that each and every individual is unique, thus, mom may have different style and approach in nurturing both until they grow as adults. Let’s now focus on building positive thoughts on children, as Alex and Sandra’s mom asked me.

What we mean by positive thoughts here is the idea of an individual to see a situation or an object from positive point of view. This way of thinking helps people coping their stress better. Positive thoughts can be built since the early childhood, please find below some steps you can apply